1/4/2024 0 Comments Whatson gambiaHealth Ministry sources told DH that the company manufactured and exported these products only to The Gambia so far. The toxic effects can include abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, inability to pass urine, headache, altered mental state, and acute kidney injury which may lead to death. The manufacturer has not provided guarantees to WHO on the safety and quality of these products.ĭiethylene glycol and ethylene glycol are toxic to humans when consumed and can prove fatal The four products are Promethazine Oral Solution, Kofexmalin Baby Cough Syrup, Makoff Baby Cough Syrup and Magrip N Cold Syrup.Īccording to the UN health body’s medical product alert, laboratory analysis of samples of each of the four products confirms that they contain unacceptable amounts of diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol as contaminants. While the contaminated products have so far only been detected in The Gambia, the WHO asked other nations to be on alert as they may have been distributed to other countries. “The loss of these young lives is beyond heartbreaking for their families,” Ghebreyesus added. He said the UN health body was conducting further investigation with the company and regulatory authorities in India. The four medicines are cough and cold syrups produced by Maiden Pharmaceuticals Limited in Haryana, India,” WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference in Geneva. “The WHO has today issued a medical product alert for four contaminated medicines identified in The Gambia that have been potentially linked with acute kidney injuries and 66 deaths among children. "At the same time, the exact one-to-one causal relation of the deaths has not yet been provided by the WHO, nor have the details of labels or products been shared with CDSCO, which would enable it to confirm the identity and source of the manufacturing of the products," the source added.The World Health Organisation on Wednesday raised an alert against four India-made cough and cold syrups whose consumption may have led to the death of more than 60 children in The Gambia, a country in west Africa. WHO has also informed India that it will share the certificate of analysis soon. According to the tentative results received by the WHO, four out of the 23 samples tested have been found to contain either Diethylene Glycol/Ethylene Glycol. It is a practice that the importing country tests the products for quality before sanctioning their usage there. The company has manufactured and exported these products only to The Gambia so far," according to PTI sources. Preliminary investigation revealed that Maiden Pharmaceutical Limited, Sonepat, Haryana, is the manufacturer licensed by the state drug controller for the products under reference, and holds manufacturing permission for these products. In a response to the WHO, the source explained that a detailed investigation was launched to ascertain the facts and details of the matter in collaboration with the Haryana State Drugs Controller. It highlighted that a significant contributing factor to the deaths was suspected to be the use of medicines that may have been contaminated with Diethylene Glycol/Ethylene Glycol, and said its presence had been confirmed in some of the samples it tested. On September 29, the WHO informed the Drugs Controller General of India that it was providing technical assistance and advice to The Gambia, according to sources as quoted by the news agency. "While all required steps will be taken, as a robust regulatory authority, WHO has been requested to share with CDSCO at the earliest the report on the establishment of a causal relation to the deaths with the medical products in question, photographs of labels/products, etc," sources told PTI. They added that the CDSCO has already taken up an urgent investigation into the matter with the regulatory authorities in Haryana.
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